A Man who built an iPhone from Spare Parts

19 Apr A Man who built an iPhone from Spare Parts

Scotty Allen: A Man who built an iPhone from Spare Parts

Now a days iPhone, iPads, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air etc. is a common Gadgets in this Techno World. Every person living in any part of the world is using a phone these days. Every 5th person today holds an Apple’s iPhone. If I write that how many people are actually utilizing more than 90% features , it will put my figure to not more than 10% figures As iPhones are Expensive and people buy them from Apple Stores, Malls, online etc. But now I will show that how a man built his own iPhone 6s with spare parts only.

Scotty Allen who is from the United States made his own iPhone 6s. To make his iPhone 6s he went to the Shenzhen Markets in China. It is the most famous markets for electronics. It has a variety of electronics at the cheapest prices. He traveled to China and explored the markets for about 9 months getting spare parts of Good Quality. The first thing he wanted was metal case i.e back of the phone, Screen, Battery and a Logic Board which has the processor and other functions to run the phone.

As he was successful in getting the metal back of the phone, but it didn’t had the laser markings which is a must for aligning cables. So he searched for the markets which can do laser markings. Once, the laser markings were done on the metal back and he was waiting for Frank outside McDonalds. Frank, a man he met during his visit to china and became friends with helped Scotty Allen to get the spare parts for the screen . So he discussed with Frank what parts would be needed to build an Iphone 6s , he said the light, OCA, Phone glass, digitiser etc. Frank suggested that we should go on repair shops they will help in screen , LCD, back making the screen of an iPhone.

The Man finally got the screen and it was working properly. In china there is App called WeChat, in this you can send messages as done in Whatsapp or Facebook or Twitter etc. and in this app you can transfer money also. They do not allow cash to be given as a mode of payment. We have to pay the money with the help of WeChat only.

Now, the main part of the Iphone should be there i.e the logic board it is the brain of the phone. He picked up a broken logic board for a few dollars. The logic board had a processor and some other tiny circuits. And also he bought a panel of four logic boards.

He thought that he could do all alone but it was not like that . So he went to a Cell phone repair School in Vonjoe called Jelon in China only and he discussed with a teacher named Wyman. But there he gave up.

So, he searched the markets with his friend Helen. She helped Scotty to get a working logic board. They found it in old phones or the repairing phones. Getting the board was not easy he had to push around in a super chaotic market with no guarantee. He set up his phone with the logic board and the battery. The screen was on but when he wanted to open the compass icon it launched but was not rotating, this resulted that the logic board is not working properly. The next day he went to shopkeeper and gave the logic board to her he showed by his testing setup that the logic board was not working properly.

Now in a bunch of days he has already got the main parts i.e the metal back, battery of apple, screen. But also now he needed smaller parts too like brackets, screws, cables, camera etc.

He got all the small parts and finally he fixed all the parts in the phone but one thing was missing , the side buttons were not working like they were not making a sound when the buttons were pressed. Now he has to go to the markets and ask that what part is missing from the phone. He described about the problem of the phone to the shopkeeper and they gave him a tiny metal circles. They are used for the buttons .

He fixed the missing part and the problem solved the sound was coming from the buttons now He finally got his new phone made. It was pretty awesome he bought an empty iPhone 6s box with a charger, charging cable, earplugs. He assembled the phone in the box and it was a new iPhone 6s in front of him.

In the last Scotty told that making a phone is not difficult. You only need some advice and helping people. It is not about rocket science . Even he is also not a techno guy he is a simple programmer. He also thanks to the Apple Engineering for making it easy to make the phones and also thanks to his friends in china who helped a lot in making his own iPhone 6s.

This video about him on YouTube was the most viral video nowadays. It has almost 60 million views in 22 hours.

“The Future Is Already Here It Is Just Not Evenly Distributed”
(William Gibson)